Unfettered Might Your Strength has increased to the point of being unnatural. Unfettered Endurance Your Endurance has increased to the point of being unnatural. Unfettered Coordination Your Coordination has increased to the point of being unnatural. Stamina is every power You spit in the eyes of the gods and indeed the laws of the universe. You no longer use mana. All costs will be redirected to stamina. Unfettered Stamina Regeneration You regenerate your stamina at an unnatural rate, Unfettered Health Regeneration Wounds were an inconvenience before. Now you can regrow limbs. Careful not to lose your head, though! Body of the Void You have touched the Void, and Void has touched you back. Outside influences, be it spell work or poison, are significantly reduced. Mind of the Void Many bodies, One mind. No matter the shape you take, you have mastered it as if it was your own. minor resistance to mental influence. Consumption of Nothing As you consume the Essence of creatures, something is lost, and something is gained. Random traits will be stolen from newly consumed essences and replaced with new ones, courtesy of the Void. Body Modification 50% Allows you to modify up to fifty percent of your mass
Alyx wasn't in the best mood as he descended the temple stairs. He was still just a little sore about being turned into an undead. Admittedly his new class had curtailed the worst of it. Not needing mana meant he wouldn't need to consume people to acquire it. His new class was, in his modest opinion pretty badass overall. All except that last bit, paying a levy to avoid and getting random effects. What if he consumed a dragon and Alyx didn't get the breath weapon? Does that mean he has to kill a second dragon? Could he consume more than one of a creature type?
Well, he would need to test that. For now, though, he studied the dagger in his hand.
"Alright, S.A.A.T. Now that I've finished up this quest, I'm free and clear to leave the elven lands. So I had a few questions about the next few steps. Things like what do standard shifters do as far as forms go? And can you point me in the direction of the nearest town? I want to learn what civilization in a magic world is all about."
Well, typically, shifters focus on obtaining a combat form, followed by one for each environment. Aquatic forms, Flying forms, and burrowing forms are pretty standard for tier five shifters. Once someone reaches tier six and can take on more powerful forms, it is common practice to gather multiple elements: Earth, fire, water, and air.
"Ah, ok, sure, it's like pokemon, but instead of capturing the little buggers with a pokeball, I'm collecting new bodies for myself. Neat"
I suppose that does fit, yes. As for the nearest towns' location and what they are like, I'm afraid I have no idea.
"What? I thought you were some all-knowing spirit of Intellect?"
I am indeed a spirit of Intellect! I know more about the system and the various paths and abilities than likely anyone on this planet! I have, however, never been here before. However, if you'd like a tour of the local moon, I do believe I give quite the rousing speech on this history of its formation. Oh, While we are there, you could beg forgiveness of luna and renounce your heretical ways!
Alyx eyed the dagger in his palm with less respect than he thought he would and considered chucking it into the bottom of the lake for that comment.
"Yeah, going to pass on that tour. I am just not sure how I feel about kissing the gods' boots. Or did you miss how Mor'noctum and Luna's claims on my soul didn't disappear?"
'Thunk.'
'Thunk, thunk, thunk.'
Just as Alyx was reaching the bottom step of the stairs and distracted by the blue box that S.A.A.T. had been about to reply with, several arrows landed squarely in his chest.
< You have been poisoned. -15% health per second >
< You have been enraptured by a spell, speed of thought reduced by 25% >
< You have been afflicted with an elven curse, -50% strength >
< You have been afflicted with an elven curse, - 50% Coordination >
< Unfettered Health Regeneration activated!>
Alyx stared down at the four arrow shafts in his chest in shock. They had done it again! Except they were trying to kill him this time. He could tell, not just because of the poison, but because those four arrows were in a concentrated grouping around his heart.
'Thunk, thunk, thunk,'
"Ah!Fuck!"
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Alyx's mind felt fuzzy from whatever had been done to those four initial arrows. So he had just been standing there like an idiot when the next three shots had come in. Three more right in the heart, Alyx thought it should hurt worse, and yes, there was a bit of sharp, biting pain, but his 50% reduction in his ability to feel the sensation of touch seemed to be surprisingly useful.
Alyx could sense his body trying to rebuild said heart and reached up, grabbing the seven arrows in one large werewolf paw that held S.A.A.T. and ripping them free with a splattering of blood. Not wanting to wait around for more shots, he began sprinting around the edge of the temple, splashing right into the shallow waters of the lake.
"Fucking backstabbing elves! Seriously, this is why everyone writes you as assholes!" Alyx shouted at the treeline he thought the arrows had come from.
In reply, he was gifted with more arrows. Not all of them landed, but these were elven rangers he was trying to dodge, and several still found their mark in his biceps and thighs. However, none of these seemed to be enchanted. If Alyx was lucky, Julius and Andrea had blown their load early.
Alyx was not a lucky man, or in this case, a man in the body of a crinos lunar wolf. As he rounded the edge of the pyramid-like temple, he found himself peppered with arrows coming from directly in front of him. Seven shots fired off so fast you'd have thought that bow had a full-auto setting.
Two arrows in each eye. One in each elbow, and one cruel shot to the groin. Oh yeah, these had to have been fired by Andrea.
Blinded and in pain, Alyx stumbled into the water. Dropping both the [Lance of the Moon] and S.A.A.T into the water as he fell. Thrashing and blind, Alyx began to panic with his head underwater at least until he realized he wasn't suffocating. 'Oh right, undead. I don't need to breathe. I would like to see though, man I hope eyes count as limbs.
Bending his arms up to pull the arrows out was simple enough, though the arrows that had lodged in his elbow joint snapped in half while still inside him. With the arrows out, Alyx sat up, out of the water. This time with an arm guarding his face as he waited to see if his eyes would grow back.
As the first pinpricks of light began to fill his vision, Alyx almost breathed a sigh of relief, even as he felt more arrows sink into his back and side. The majority of the arrows were not doing a lot of damage, so he felt comfortable just hunkering down in the water until his eyesight finished returning.
As you might imagine, this was a mistake as it gave Julius and Andrea time to move closer and charge up their specialties. The mana cost for these attacks is staggering and would leave them vulnerable for several hours afterward should they use them, which is why they attempted to take down Alyx using lesser abilities first.
Watching the shape-shifter shrug those abilities off had done an excellent job of convincing them they needed to up the ante. Julius loosed his shot first. A seemingly ordinary-looking arrow that cut through the distance between them like a bullet, the arrow struck Alyx in the back left shoulder and cut a hole through him, launching out the other side to embed itself in the stone of the temple.
Alyx turned to face where the arrow had come from, blood pouring from both ends of the wound. His sight mostly returned to normal by now. In doing so, he turned his back to Andrea, whose shot was arguably the more lethal of the two.
Andrea's arrow, glowing with both fire and kinetic magics, crackled as she drew back her bow. She'd never failed to take down a target with her bomb arrow, and she'd be damned if she was going to lose her record to a human. A smug smirk crossed her lips as she loosed the arrow, which rocketed away from her without a sound. Only to release a thunderous clap as it struck Alyx, the arrow released a massive blast of firey kinetic energy. Thre Blast consumed stone, water, and werewolves in a fifteen-foot radius.
Alyx was sent flying through the air by the explosion. Sound and light bombarded him as he hurtled through the air, only to skip over the water like a stone. Hurtled out over the lake as he was, when he lost momentum, Alyx slipped beneath the surface of the water.
'That. Hurt.' Most of his fur was missing on the back half of his body, and Alyx's tail had been blown off. Along with most of his right hand and left leg, all the way up to the knee. The tail just felt more important somehow, well, whatever, it must be a werewolf thing.
Ears ringing from the explosive magics, Alyx let himself sink to the bottom of the lake as his limbs regrew. It was...disgusting, watching bone regrow, and then the muscles writhe before attaching themselves. How everything knew where to go and what to regrow was beyond him, he'd barely studied anatomy in high school, so his regen was the product of his class and not something Alyx had any control over.
Once his limbs had regrown, Alyx took a few moments to consider his options. It wasn't precisely dark at the bottom of the lake, probably because it wasn't all that deep and the water was clear. So Alyx should assume they know he's still alive, which leads to how to win this fight.
Did Alyx even want to win this fight? Even if he beat Julius and Andrea, what then, more reason for the elves to chase after him if he killed them.'Fuck I dropped S.A.A.T and the [Lance of the Moon] though, I need at least the dagger. Guess that means it's a fight after all.'
Alyx pondered what had changed to get him to 50% body modification. As he hadn't received any notifications about the ability as bones grew out of his skin and covered him in armor, giving him a chest piece, bracers, and leg guards all made of his bone.
It would be better than nothing, so Alyx walked along the bottom of the lake, not taking a moment to marvel at the absurdity of his scenario or the beauty around him. He focused on figuring out where his two adversaries were and how to reach them before they turned him into a pincushion again.
Besides, Alyx was currently a freaky werewolf, and his stats were through the roof! Dammit, how could he not want to try them out a least a little, right? I mean, if fifty strength turned his human form into an Olympic level weight lifter, what did one hundred and fifty do to a werewolf?
As Alyx breached the surface of the lake and glanced around for Julius and Andrea, he resolved to find out.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
They had blown the damn monster clear across the lake, it should have been a clear and overwhelming victory ut as seconds passed and turned to minutes still no kill notification came. Julius and Andrea crept slowly toward the water's edge, bows out and arrows drawn, ready to release another volley with what limited mana reserves they had left.
And yet they could find no sign of Alyx, no hulking shape lurking in the water waiting to burst out at them. perhaps he'd swum toward a different shore, but even then the two elven rangers would have seen him slinking out of the water.
Wary but determined to find Alyx Andrea took the lead, circling the lake with Julius. Their Eye's scanning the edge of the water, the two still missed him. Alyx had crept up beneath a tree that had fallen into the lake, hiding between the branches, he waited for the two ready to pounce, and ounce he did, shattering the waterlogged tree as he burst from the muddy bottom of the lake.
Julius and Andrea, trained survivalists reacted quickly and with trained reflexes to Alyx's appearance, but the void enhanced shifter simply outclassed the pair in terms of speed.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Alyx closed the distance between himself and the elven ranger in a matter of moments, his front leg snapping up into a pushing front kick that launched the elven woman off of her feet and into the air. Her bow slipping from her hands and clattering to the ground as she sailed forty feet through the air to smash back first against a tree.
Turning now on, Julius Alyx found this opponent slightly more prepared. In the time it had taken him to kick Andrea away, Julius had dropped his bow and unsheathed an elven short sword and dagger. Though Alyx was the faster of the two at this point, Julius stepped forward first. Slashing first with the dagger and then the sword, Alyx stepped back reflexively to avoid being cut. Whether or not the blades could do enough damage to slow Alyx down, let alone kill him, didn't occur to Alyx at that moment. When someone comes at you with a knife, you get the fuck out of the way.
Having pushed Alyx back, Julius pressed the attack working the blades with both skill and Skills. A flurry of blows that Alyx certainly did not want to try his hand against, not with his brand new anathema. Those blades looked like steel to him, so Alyx kept backing up, letting Julius push him around the edge of the lake and trying to get a bead on his rhythm.
Under most circumstances, Julius probably could have kept Alyx on the back foot long enough for Andrea to renter the fight. As things stood, though, Julius had exhausted himself on a high mana cost ability, and it only took a few more seconds for Alyx to spot the opening he needed.
Surging forward, behind the blade of the sword, Alyx's left hand shot out to grab the forearm of the hand that held the knife. Using his new grip to drag Julius closer, he headbutted the elf. The single blow drove Julius to his knees unconscious.
"Huh...one hit?" Alyx looked over into the tree line to see Andrea slowly struggling to her feet, gripping her ribs, likely with some of them broken. Alyx didn't want to deal with either her or Julius again. He went back to where the fight started and grabbed both of their bows before tossing them into the lake.
"Yeeet"
"Well, that should pretty much take care of that. Now let's go grab my damn loot."